OKAY KIDS, TIME FOR BEDLAM! by Debbie Harbeson

 

INTRODUCTION

Many thoughtful books on the subject of homeschooling have been published in recent years.  Some are full of ideas about learning and take the reader into the depths of philosophical thought.  Some are full of specific resources and advice about how to homeschool.  This isn’t one of them.

Highly intelligent people wrote those books.  I’m not one of them.

Let me give you some background.  My husband John and I have two children, Melissa and Keith.  I was a full-time mom from the time my first child was born.  I didn’t want to miss a thing motherhood had to offer.

I wanted to be the one my children spit up on.  I wanted to be the one to endure the whines and the screams.  I wanted to be the one to clean up after they found the open box of cornstarch and maple syrup and thought the mixture would make a great skin lotion.  But after about 6 years of this, life changed.  My kids entered school.

It didn’t take long to realize I had a huge problem.  I did not have enough stress in my life.  So in October of 1991, when my daughter was in second grade and my son, first grade, I decided to homeschool.  I saw how classrooms operated and felt confident I could do just as good a job of ignoring their individual needs.

Okay, my husband thinks I need to stop joking around, if only for a moment, and give at least some explanation of why I decided to do such an offbeat thing.  He said some readers would actually want to know why our family thought homeschooling would be a good idea.  For some reason, he still lives under the delusion that I might one day take his advice.

Okay, okay, readers genuinely interested in a more serious description of why I made this decision can consult the Epilogue.  It contains my comments as well as interviews with the family.  I apologize for not including an Appendix, but unfortunately it ruptured and had to be removed.

Let me start my story by describing the night before our first day of officially homeschooling.  My memory is a bit blurry so wait a second while I find my glasses.  Ah, that’s better.  Anyway, on that first night, I was so excited I couldn’t sleep.  I rolled around imagining the wonderful experiences I would share with my children as we explored the world together.

My stomach tingled with the same excitement I feel when I am about to go over the first hill on a roller coaster.  I ignored the fact I hate roller coasters and scream through the entire ride while clawing at my riding companion until I finally get on solid ground again.  I don’t know when I finally fell asleep, but the last time I looked it was 4:30 in the morning.

Chapter One

Do You Know Where Your Children Are?

 

I awoke to the sounds of my two children, Melissa, 8, and Keith, 6, arguing and wrestling on my husband’s side of the bed. John was already gone and I realized it

must have been him that kissed me goodbye earlier instead of Antonio Banderas.

‘We should wake her up.’

‘No, don’t, she’ll be in a bad mood all day if we do.’

‘She’ll be in a bad mood if we don’t.’

I tried not to move. I felt someone’s breath on my face. Then one of my eyelids fluttered.

‘Hey Mom! What’re we gonna do today, huh?’ yelled Keith.

I winced and pulled my pillow over my head.

‘Yeah Mom, shouldn’t school be starting or something?’ inquired Melissa.

‘Our first official homeschooling project is breakfast,’ I said, dragging myself out of bed.

I was enjoying the sugar-laden, vitamin fortified, crunchy goodness, anxiously awaiting the insulin surge, when I noticed Keith waving his hand in the air.

‘Keith, what are you doing? You don’t need to raise your hand to talk to me.’

‘Well, I need to go to the bathroom,’ he said, frantically slapping his feet together.

‘You can get a drink and go to the bathroom any time. You don’t have to raise your hand, OK?’

‘Cool!’ he said and ran off. I yelled at him to change into his clothes after he finished.

‘Well Mom,’ said Melissa, as she grabbed the cereal box and began eating all of the marshmallows. ‘What’re we gonna do today?’

‘I thought we’d go to the library.’

She suddenly stopped chomping. ‘Do I have to get only second grade books?’ she sputtered, looking worried.

‘Heck, no, you can read anything that looks interesting,’ I said, feeling smug about our new adventure. The sugar was kicking in.

‘Double cool!’ and she ran off to get ready.

The excitement was back. As I changed for our library trip, I relived the dreams of how our family would have so much fun learning and discovering the world together, in harmony. I soon realized dreaming is best-done while sleeping.

Keith came hopping down the stairs holding a glass of water. ‘Where’s Melissa?’ I asked.

He took a big drink and said, ‘She’s on her bed reading a book.’

‘Well, go tell her we’re leaving.’ He hopped back up the stairs, splashing water on the floor and yelling for Stupidhead.

Several minutes later Melissa came down, reading a t-shirt label she just tore off.

‘Ok, now where’s Keith?’ I asked.

‘I think he’s in the bathroom.’

‘What’s he doing?’

‘I really don’t want to know Mom, thank you very much.’ So much for my goal of holding on to their natural sense of curiosity.

I yelled up the stairs, ‘Keith, come on let’s go!’ No answer.

I grunted in frustration. ‘Melissa, please go up there and get him while I find the car keys.’

Several more minutes passed and Keith came bouncing down singing, ‘It’s so cool, ain’t it cool, not like school, not like school, I can use the bathroom anytime I want to.’

‘Okay, now where’s Melissa?’

‘What?’ I must have interrupted his lyric writing. ‘Uh, she’s laying on her stomach in the hallway reading a magazine - and I didn’t mean to step on her back Mom, really.’

‘Keith, just go get in the car.’ I climbed the stairs again and pulled the magazine out of Melissa’s hand.

‘Hey, I was reading that,’ she growled.

‘Melissa. Let’s go.’

Before I locked the front door, I looked outside to make sure they were both in the car. Keith was walking on the car hood finishing off a glass of water. Melissa was sitting on the grass reading the mail.

When we arrived at the library, Keith took off to the bathroom. He was mad because Melissa had been trying to make him laugh so he would wet his pants.

Then Melissa got mad at me when I told her she could not spend the night at the library and would just have to pick a few books to take home.

I hauled a stack of books and two pouting kids to the counter. The librarian checking us out asked, ‘Why aren’t you guys in school?’

‘Oh, well, um, we’re homeschooling,’ I said, a bit timidly, not sure of her reaction. She raised her eyebrows but made no remark.

She turned her attention to my kids, the ones with the sour faces. ‘So what’s your favorite thing about homeschooling so far?’

‘Nothing. I hate it,’ said Melissa, arms folded. ‘Mom says I can’t spend the night here. I don’t see why since I won’t have to get up to catch the bus.’

‘Oh,’ the librarian said with a sparkle in her eyes, ‘you must really like books. Me too. Sometimes I wish I could spend the night here.’

‘You do?’ Melissa brightened. ‘Well, really I guess it’s going to be fun because I can read any book I want!’

‘Oh, my that’s wonderful isn’t it? I hope we see you here often. We have tons of -.’

Keith interrupted her. ‘Well, the best thing for me is I can get a drink and go to the bathroom anytime I want! And without raising my hand! Your bathroom here is awesome, every one of your flushers works! But that one faucet don’t work so good, so, um, sorry about the wet floor.’

While the librarian absorbed this information, I quickly collected the books and we returned home for a late lunch. The phone rang and as I got up to answer it, Melissa and Keith started fighting over the ketchup bottle. I grabbed the bottle out of Melissa’s hand and slammed it on the table. The lid popped off, bounced off the dining room light and hit my little toe. The ketchup sprayed out of the bottle and splattered on the ceiling.

My kids watched a real act as I glared at them, teeth clenched, hopping and rubbing my toe, while my voice remained cheery as I told my new homeschooling acquaintance, ‘Why, yes, our first day is going great.’

Chapter Seven

Something Screwy’s Going On Around Here

 

‘Look, there’s more down here.’ I said as I bent over and peered under a dining room chair. ‘John, these things are really becoming pests. The little buggers are everywhere: in the carpet, the bed, and even the cottage cheese.’

‘The cottage cheese? Ok, that has to be Keith’s fault,’ he said.

‘Maybe for the cottage cheese, but this whole pest problem is your fault.’

‘Oh, Debbie, it’s no big deal. And quit calling them pests. They’re just computer screws. We’ll get ‘em ok? Come on Keith, let’s round them up. And anyway,’ my husband continued, ‘It’s all ultimately your fault. Remember? When we were dating?’

‘What are you guys talking about?’ asked Keith filling his pockets with screws.

‘Well, Keith,’ said John, ‘When I was dating your mother, I had two big interests, computers and disco dancing. But I couldn’t decide which one to make my career. So one night, your mother suggested I flip one of my platform shoes and let fate decide. If the shoe landed right side up, disco dancing would be the obvious choice. However, if the shoe landed upside down, then the computer career it would be.’

He stopped picking up screws, stared up in the air and let out a long nostalgic sigh. Then he continued, ‘I still remember it to this day, I threw that lime-green shoe and we watched as it descended, clearly headed right side up, until it hit a low-hanging disco ball and landed upside down, the imitation leather smashed against a yellow square on the blinking dance floor.’ He sighed again.

‘Well thank God for that disco ball!’ said Keith shaking his head. ‘Otherwise we’d be living out on the streets with nothing but the leisure suits on our backs.’

‘Ok, you’re right’ I said, ‘We did luck out there, but I didn’t anticipate the problems that came with this computer interest.’ I slapped my forehead and continued, ‘You know, I should have known I had a situation on my hands when we discovered our son fell asleep much easier to the sounds of a softly clicking keyboard rather than a lullaby. And then when he began singing the ABC song, ‘a-s-d-f, j-k-l...”

‘”q-w-e-r-t-y-u,’ Keith continued, but stopped after he saw my face.

But what did I expect? After all, this man thinks a computer screen emits a much more romantic glow than candles.

‘You have to admit, Debbie. These kids are learning a lot about computers and they’ll be far ahead of their peers.’

‘Yeah, but John, come on, we simply have to do something here. You and Keith have taken in every stray, mangy computer part other people throw away. And they are filling up our home. Look around. We have computers, monitors, printers, software, motherboards, cases, mice, and electrical cords.’

‘Don’t forget the screws,’ Keith said helpfully.

‘Look,’ said John, ‘I think I have a solution. We just need to designate one special area for the computer stuff. Let’s put it in the corner of the living room.’

So far I had managed to keep that room looking normal. But I reluctantly agreed, after all, it was helping my kid’s education. From this point on, when they wanted to fix a friend’s computer or build one for them, they took it to this designated workstation. I still found screws, but at least they were in a more concentrated area.

They almost always worked on the computers on Saturday afternoons and when I came around to check on their progress I would see the two of them relaxing on the couch watching some sporting event.

‘Oh, are you done? I thought we could go hiking.’

‘No, not yet.’

‘But how can you be working on the computer if you’re watching the game?’

Keith said, ‘Well, Mom, sometimes you have to wait for the computer’s operating system to load, detect hardware and run touchdowns, I mean, run software. And you have to be here to hit the right buttons when they score, I mean, to continue the program. Don’t worry, we should have it done very soon.’

I’m not stupid. After an entire football, basketball and baseball season, I noticed ‘very soon’ corresponded almost exactly with the end of the game.

But that’s ok. I have to admit our kids have learned a lot. I just wish I could get used to the mess.

I need to remember my best friend’s wisdom when I complained to her. ‘Just be glad it’s not cars they love,’ she said, as we sat in her living room next to two hubcaps, a used oil filter and a rusty muffler.

Oh, and they could be making disco balls.

About the author and this book:

Debbie Harbeson says:”Okay Kids, Time for Bedlam!” is a labor of love. It is the lighter side of life, told by Debbie Harbeson, an average mom who rather unknowingly lobbed herself into the often loopy world of homeschooling.

This is what happens to you, when you purposely allow your children to skip school to learn at home... and it’s a riot! The whole endeavor, needless to say, has been a learning experience for everyone. And hopefully, a story you all can enjoy from the safety of your own home.

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